Teachers have to deal with a lot! Along with the heavy expectations of school boards, they also have to manage unruly children and the demands of every parent. There are many good teachers who push through to provide the best education to their students and also motivate them to do better.
One such teacher shared her experience dealing with an entitled parent who wanted to get her son’s failing grades changed by any means necessary, despite the lack of effort from the boy all year.
More info: Reddit
Demanding mom steps in to pressure a teacher to pass her son, not realizing how many chances the educator already gave her kid
Image credits: August de Richelieu (not the actual photo)
High school teacher had a student who made no effort all year and did not participate in class, he never listened to her or did the extra credit she gave, leading to him getting failing grades
Image credits: Karolina Grabowska (not the actual photo)
His mother requested a parent-teacher conference and asked the teacher to drop all the grades that were making him fail, she kept pushing despite the teacher’s refusal
Image credits: tinylearnings
When the teacher offered to replace the boy’s lowest grades with what he earned on an extra credit assignment, the entitled mom refused and ended up leaving
The schools of today aren’t always friendly towards teachers. According to Edutopia, “given the influence many parents have, and the fear of lawsuits on the part of many administrators, teachers seem to have little support in this new dynamic.” It has been observed that because parents tend to believe their children first when issues arise in the classrooms, they might end up pressuring teachers to conform to their demands.
Bored Panda reached out to an educator (who wished to remain anonymous) to understand more about the school system and to learn about their experience with entitled parents. They said, “there has been a shift in education over the years that has created additional challenges. It seems like parents are more empowered and entitled than ever before, which has led to a decrease in teachers and administrators’ ability to effectively run schools.”
They added that “there are many demands, such as how classrooms and schools should be run, whether or not a school can discipline their child for bad behavior, not following classroom and school policies justified by their demands to have special treatment for their child. If parents do not get their way, they complain, [leading to] even more time and energy taken away to deal with them and this takes away from the efficacy of the entire school. Entitled parents email all the time taking up a teacher’s time and make them explain everything every day to them.”
It has been noted that kids who are raised by demanding or entitled caregivers tend to emulate their parents and might also develop a bad attitude. Apart from the downside of children learning about or performing such actions, it’s important to note that the kid’s future can also be affected. A parent who forces others to conform to their will and smoothens out all the obstacles in their child’s way is only setting up the kid for failure. In this case, if the boy was passed without reason, he would never put in effort for anything in the future.
Image credits: RDNE Stock project (not the actual photo)
The teacher we interviewed mentioned that “entitled parents with a lack of accountability or logical consequences for their child have been allowed to get to the point where they can impede a classroom teacher's ability to effectively run a class and create major emotional trauma on the educators.” This kind of system has also led to a high rate of teacher burnout affecting 44% of K-12 teachers and 35% of university and college educators.
The poster told commenters that, “I don't plan on backing down on my position. The one study guide he has that he can turn in for extra credit is given to all of my students. They all have the same opportunity to drop and replace their lowest grade with it which is why I told the mother that it was the best I could do.” Despite providing a reasonable solution to help the boy pass, his mom did not budge on the issue and wanted the problem solved with no effort on her son’s part.
The educator whom we reached out to said that “simply put, society has turned [people] into unaccountable and ‘victim-based’ citizens that are empowered to not do their part to help create a positive education system. Their children have been empowered to misbehave and not support the teacher without any consequences for so long that it is just assumed now that parents’ demands are more important than school policies and procedures.”
It’s also important for parents to understand that while they are trying to make their kids’ lives easier, they’re actually setting them up for failure. Intense parental involvement has been shown to cause higher levels of stress among children and lead to intrafamilial conflict in some cases. This is why adults should take a step back and let educators do their job, especially in situations like this.
Luckily the teacher did not back down even when faced with such pressure from the boy’s mother. She shared that despite giving the kid an extra credit assignment to do, she was sure he wouldn’t make the effort. Unfortunately, educators have to deal with many parents like this and only time will tell if things will get better. Do you think the poster should have done anything different in this situation? Share your thoughts in the comments.
People sided with the teacher and told her to stand her ground if the mom took further action
Image credits: George Pak (not the actual photo)
